# NK's latest threat against the US question **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [April 23, 2017, 6:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/nks-latest-threat-against-the-us-question/785091 "2017-04-23T18:50:25Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 13\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![Ravenman](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ravenman/32/2929_2.png) [@Ravenman](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ravenman)\ **Post date:** [April 25, 2017, 3:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/nks-latest-threat-against-the-us-question/785091/41 "2017-04-25T15:48:57Z")
Not directly on topic on the question of an attack on an aircraft carrier, but an interesting article today on North Korea’s war plans: [http://www.realcleardefense.com/articles/2017/04/25/thunder\_run\_to\_seoul\_assessing\_north\_koreas\_war\_plan\_111241.html](http://www.realcleardefense.com/articles/2017/04/25/thunder_run_to_seoul_assessing_north_koreas_war_plan_111241.html) ---
**Author:** ![Tzigone](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/839c29/32.png) [@Tzigone](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tzigone)\ **Post date:** [April 25, 2017, 4:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/nks-latest-threat-against-the-us-question/785091/42 "2017-04-25T16:52:07Z")
Any ideas on how the [senate](http://www.reuters.com/article/us-northkorea-nuclear-usa-senate-idUSKBN17Q1LR) briefing about NK will go? I wouldn’t bother starting a thread about it before there’s reporting on the event tomorrow, but since this thread is already here… ---
**Author:** ![Dissonance](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/85f322/32.png) [@Dissonance](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dissonance)\ **Post date:** [April 25, 2017, 9:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/nks-latest-threat-against-the-us-question/785091/43 "2017-04-25T21:44:30Z")
> [@Tranquilis](#): > > ASROC had a relatively small 10KT warhead; I think we can count on the DPRK to place their largest feasable warhead in any putative submarine; we _know_ they’ve managed 45kt. The Baker Test (Operation Crossroads), at half that, created a base surge 3.5 miles in diameter - Meaning a mission-kill at a distance of nearly two miles (getting washed down with high-velocity radioactively-contaminated water will end your deployment right then and there) - And that’s with half the weapon that we KNOW the DPRK can deploy - They might have larger. I don’t know what your nuclear experience is, but its not close to correct with regards to [Test Baker](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Crossroads#Test_Baker), which didn’t create a ‘base surge’ of 3.5 miles: > [@](#): > > Twelve seconds after detonation, falling water from the column started to create a \*\*900-foot \*\*(274 m) tall “base surge” resembling the mist at the bottom of a large waterfall. Unlike the water wave, the base surge rolled over rather than under the ships. Of all the bomb’s effects, the base surge had the greatest consequence for most of the target ships, because it painted them with radioactivity that could not be removed. Test Baker used a 23kt weapon detonated directly underneath LSM-60 in the middle of the target formation; the farthest ship from the blast to be sunk was drydock ARDC-13 at a range of 1,150 yards from the blast. If you’ll note, the ASROC test shot photo I linked to earlier was fired at a target 2 miles from the firing ship. Given your experience in submarines, I don’t understand how you imagine a 40 year old boat with a top speed slower than the cruising speed of a CVBG is going to get itself close to, much less quietly position itself directly underneath a US carrier. Given this, speculating on what size warhead they could actually place on said theoretical suicide submarine is rather pointless. ---
**Author:** ![Quartz](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/quartz/32/267_2.png) [@Quartz](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Quartz)\ **Post date:** [April 25, 2017, 10:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/nks-latest-threat-against-the-us-question/785091/44 "2017-04-25T22:41:56Z")
> [@Dissonance](#): > > Given your experience in submarines, I don’t understand how you imagine a 40 year old boat with a top speed slower than the cruising speed of a CVBG is going to get itself close to, much less quietly position itself directly underneath a US carrier. I remember reading a book which posited just such a scenario. The book had a Russian submarine loiter ahead of where the carrier was expected to be and fire a nuclear-tipped torpedo when the carrier came into range. It then escaped in the confusion after the explosion. ---
**Author:** ![LSLGuy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lslguy/32/5813_2.png) [@LSLGuy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/LSLGuy)\ **Post date:** [April 27, 2017, 12:04am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/nks-latest-threat-against-the-us-question/785091/45 "2017-04-27T00:04:32Z")
> [@Dissonance](#): > > … > Given your experience in submarines, I don’t understand how you imagine a 40 year old boat with a top speed slower than the cruising speed of a CVBG is going to get itself close to, much less quietly position itself directly underneath a US carrier. Given this, speculating on what size warhead they could actually place on said theoretical suicide submarine is rather pointless. The whole point of the method with old diesel-electric boats is to place an array of them out in front of where you expect the CVBG to go. The DE boats just sit on the bottom or hover silently in the water column and wait and hope for the CVBG to come to them. Pursuing the CVBG is \*not \*part of the equation In effect the subs are nuclear mines. Once the CVBG gets close enough to one “mine” it detonates. As with mine warfare, the tradeoff is lots of waiting and lots of “mines” that never get the chance to detonate at all. But those that do are \*very \*effective. ---
**Author:** ![Velocity](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/velocity/32/18006_2.png) [@Velocity](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Velocity)\ **Post date:** [April 27, 2017, 12:24am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/nks-latest-threat-against-the-us-question/785091/46 "2017-04-27T00:24:37Z")
Have a fishing trawler with a nuclear weapon concealed inside. Have the trawler relay a distress message, an SOS, requiring immediate help, fisherman with appendicitis or whatnot, etc. Or, “trawler adrift, engine doesn’t work,” to explain why the trawler can’t stop heading in the carrier’s direction… ---
**Author:** ![busterpickle](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/258eb7/32.png) [@busterpickle](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/busterpickle)\ **Post date:** [April 27, 2017, 1:20am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/nks-latest-threat-against-the-us-question/785091/47 "2017-04-27T01:20:37Z")
> [@Velocity](#): > > Have a fishing trawler with a nuclear weapon concealed inside. Have the trawler relay a distress message, an SOS, requiring immediate help, fisherman with appendicitis or whatnot, etc. > > Or, “trawler adrift, engine doesn’t work,” to explain why the trawler can’t stop heading in the carrier’s direction… Just drive the carrier away from it and send a RHIB boat to check out the distress. Any ways, what Little Nemo said, going after the carrier is dumb. If it were me, I’d go after the most forward deployed ships since they are closer and as you pick them off one by one you decrease the effectiveness of the carrier group. There’s also plenty of low-tech tactics I can think of like: [ol] [li]lots of chaff[/li][li]lotsa dummy missles followed by live missles[/li][li]oil slick on fire[/li][li]dirty bombs to contaminate the surface of the ships and impact crew[/li][li]lotsa dummy boats with a few “live” ones[/li][li]force the direction of the carrier group by lotsa dummy sea mines and a few real ones[/li][li]lotsa dummy boats making lotsa acoustical noise while one of their subs moves in[/li][li]maybe lotsa of those “cocaine” subs thats are like a U-boat where they lie just below the surface of the water[/li][li]fishing nets with chains floating beneath the water or even on top as when the hull slides over it’ll push them to the props[/li][/ol] ---
**Author:** ![lazybratsche](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/ba8739/32.png) [@lazybratsche](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/lazybratsche)\ **Post date:** [April 27, 2017, 12:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/nks-latest-threat-against-the-us-question/785091/48 "2017-04-27T12:17:25Z")
> [@Little\_Nemo](#): > > Have you ever heard about Millennium Challenge 2002? It was a naval exercise in 2002. > > A Marine Corps General was supposed to be defending an invasion site from an amphibious attack by the Navy. He devised a plan to have speed boats attack the Navy ships. The weapons on the Navy ships were designed to attack big combat vessels not a mass of small maneuverable speed boats. The Navy “sank” a lot of the boats but not all of them. The boats that survived “sank” sixteen Navy ships, including a carrier. > > The referees decided the attack didn’t count. They ruled that all the ships that had been “sank” and personnel who had been “killed” were back in action. The Marine Corps General was ordered to stop using any unconventional or unexpected tactics. I was curious about this, so I looked it up. Apparently, the 16 ships were sunk by a massive surprise attack using cruise missiles – the “swarm” at that point was mostly used to locate the ships and launch a few missiles. Later direct attacks from small boats managed to sink a few more ships. Now, it does seem that the US Navy is taking the threat from small craft more seriously. Most new warships are getting a mix of weapons designed to take out swarms of attackers: 30 mm and 57 mm autocannons, Hellfire missiles, etc. FWIW that exercise was based in the Persian Gulf, where it’s basically impossible to “hide” a carrier since everywhere is within ~50 miles of shore and there’s a ton of civilian traffic. There should be a lot more room to operate and maneuver a carrier group in the Yellow Sea or Sea of Japan. NK “pleasure boats” driving 200 miles into the middle of the ocean are going to be awfully conspicuous… ---
**Author:** ![XT](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/xt/32/456_2.png) [@XT](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/XT)\ **Post date:** [April 27, 2017, 4:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/nks-latest-threat-against-the-us-question/785091/49 "2017-04-27T16:53:49Z")
> [@AK84](#): > > Ok, now that everyone, even those who should know better have had their "_The NORKS are dumb, ha ha ha_"moment lets look at [their actual inventory.](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Korean_People%27s_Army_Air_Force#Current_inventory), both MiG-29 and Su-25 have an anti-ship capability, and potentially so does the MiG-27 and J-7. In addition, they have H-5 bombers which could be modified to carry anti-ship missiles. Their inventory includes both [Kh-31](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kh-31)and [Kh-35](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kh-35)missiles, which these platforms could carry. > > Would it be easy? Hell no, USN carrier groups are well defended, but yes they absolutely have the ability to find and hit a carrier and the threat is real… Its more likely that they’ll fail, but to say that at best “they might scratch the paint” as some very remarkably ill-informed poster says up-thread is silly at best and hubristic at worst. > > Since if even one or two AShM’s hit the carrier, that ship and its crew is in for a lousy morning, I suspect in a shooting the ship will operate outside the range of these missiles, which will, in turn, reduce its own effectiveness. Too much risk for too little reward otherwise. According to your own cite they have (theoretically…this doesn’t make the distinction between having and operational…nor does it talk about trained pilots, but let’s skip that) 40 MIG 29B/UB and 35 MIG 25s. The MIG 27s aren’t listed in your cite nor do I see them in the NK OOB, but let’s say they have a like number…35-40. Even leaving aside the fact that the South Koreans have their own interceptors AND that the USAF also has planes deployed to SK, the carrier group alone is going to have a pretty big advantage over the force you are talking about here…and this leaves aside a lot of the reality of how well trained the NK pilots are on those birds conducting anti-naval operations out where the carrier group actually is. And they would be risking ALL of their more advanced fighters in such a raid that would have a fairly low probability of actually sinking the carrier. You did acknowledge this, but several posters said this before your post, so not ALL of the posts were “_The NORKS are dumb, ha ha ha_” responses. As to the OP the factual answer is that the NKs pose very little threat to a carrier group operating in blue water, especially one that’s supported by the US and its allies array of satellite recon data, land based support, etc etc. The Millennium Challenge 2002 scenario discussed earlier wouldn’t really be a factor as the carrier group wouldn’t be in constrained waters (it was also a one off attack that relied on surprise and the fact that the Navy leadership hadn’t really thought about that sort of attack being a treat at the time…I doubt anyone in this situation would be similarly fooled). The biggest thing is that this would be a HUGE roll of the dice for the NKs. Even positing a scenario where they tried the air attack (maybe in conjunction with using their older fighters as a screne or to soak up the land based response from the US and SK) coupled with some sort of armed Q-ships AND with their submarine thread the odds would be pretty long of actually hitting and taking out the carrier…and nothing else in the battle group would be worth the risk. ---
**Author:** ![Calder](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/e99b99/32.png) [@Calder](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Calder)\ **Post date:** [April 27, 2017, 11:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/nks-latest-threat-against-the-us-question/785091/50 "2017-04-27T23:36:14Z")
A couple of points I don’t see listed anywhere. 1. Naval navigation and attack by aircraft is hard. This takes a lot of training and is not something you can just wing. Navigating over the sea with no land navigation aids is very difficult. In addition is it easy to tell when you are training for this and we know they haven’t done this kind of training. 2. The Ocean is HUGE. Find a Nuclear Carrier at sea is extremely difficult. None of the attack profiles listed for the North Koreans I have seen are going to work unless the they already know where the carrier is and the carrier just sits there and waits for the attack. ---
**Author:** ![Elendil\_s\_Heir](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/7cd45c/32.png) [@Elendil\_s\_Heir](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Elendil_s_Heir)\ **Post date:** [May 2, 2017, 8:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/nks-latest-threat-against-the-us-question/785091/51 "2017-05-02T20:01:00Z")
> [@si\_blakely](#): > > I didn’t suggest that a NK submarine could penetrate the destroyer defensive screen to get into an attack position - I think there is a very low likelihood of that succeeding… You never know (Chinese, but still): [The uninvited guest: Chinese sub pops up in middle of U.S. Navy exercise, leaving military chiefs red-faced | Daily Mail Online](http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-492804/The-uninvited-guest-Chinese-sub-pops-middle-U-S-Navy-exercise-leaving-military-chiefs-red-faced.html) ---
**Author:** ![busterpickle](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/258eb7/32.png) [@busterpickle](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/busterpickle)\ **Post date:** [May 3, 2017, 7:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/nks-latest-threat-against-the-us-question/785091/52 "2017-05-03T19:25:26Z")
> [@Calder](#): > > A couple of points I don’t see listed anywhere. > > 1. Naval navigation and attack by aircraft is hard. This takes a lot of training and is not something you can just wing. Navigating over the sea with no land navigation aids is very difficult. In addition is it easy to tell when you are training for this and we know they haven’t done this kind of training. > > 2. The Ocean is HUGE. Find a Nuclear Carrier at sea is extremely difficult. None of the attack profiles listed for the North Koreans I have seen are going to work unless the they already know where the carrier is and the carrier just sits there and waits for the attack. If there was active GPS denial for civilian and GLONASS it for sure would be hard to navigate. However, the majority of sea battles were before the advent of GPS. If NK isn’t used to having this technology in abundance then it won’t matter and they’ll already know how to navigate without these aids. If the carrier group is silent, then true, it’ll be hard to find. Probably not in shipping lanes to avoid identification and location, so, as soon as radar is “turning and burning” they’ll stick out like a sore thumb. And, the technology to simply locate the source of the RF isn’t that complex or advanced. Just fly around in a circle with a highly directional antenna and you’ll figure it out in short order. This reminds me of the last/on-going war. They use morse code over radio with some really old equipment so the quality is extremely poor. Using anything automated wasn’t working so they had to bring back humans again. We could be at totally opposite of the spectrum in regards to technology and we’ll have no affect on each other. ---
**Author:** ![sweat209](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/9fc348/32.png) [@sweat209](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/sweat209)\ **Post date:** [May 3, 2017, 8:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/nks-latest-threat-against-the-us-question/785091/53 "2017-05-03T20:10:21Z")
> [@Little\_Nemo](#): > > The North Koreans are never going to be able to out-tech the United States. Their only hope of success is a cheap swarm attack. Launch a bunch of missiles, torpedoes, small craft, mini-subs and jets. Figure most of them will be destroyed. But if there’s enough of them a few will get through and inflict serious damage. \*\*That is why modern aircraft carriers are obsolete now. \*\* The future is drone navy and drone aircraft. What the US should be doing is building lots and lots of small aircraft carriers just 10 to 12 aircraft at the most. North Korea will probably use swarm attack. Small swarm aircraft carriers is the future to fight of these countries. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/nks-latest-threat-against-the-us-question/785091.md?page=2)